Luke 16 (NKJV)

“So it was that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s bosom. The rich man also died and was buried. And being in torments in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off and Lazarus in his bosom. “Then he cried and said, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.’ But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things; but now he is comforted and you are tormented. And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, so that those who want to pass from here to you cannot, nor can those from there pass to us.’” (Verses 22-26)

Before we consider the parabolic interpretation of the last five verses of our parable let us for a moment, consider what the implication would be if we were to consider them literal.

Verse 27 and 28 “Then he said, ‘I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father’s house, for I have five brothers that he may testify to them, lest they also come to this place of torment.’”

Here again we find someone who is supposedly in hell suffering its torments and yet he still has found a way to converse with someone in heaven (a miracle in itself), and not only this but petitioning him to send Lazarus to his father’s house to speak to his brothers.

Verse 29 “Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’”

How could they have Moses, are we to assume that Moses was still alive at the time, and even if he were, why wasn’t he and the rest of the prophets in heaven with Abraham?

Were they not poor enough or destitute, afflicted, and tormented enough to qualify for heaven as Lazarus did? (Compare Heb 11:36-38)

Verse 30 and 31 “And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent. But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’ ”

Why send a stranger? Were the five brother’s familiar with Lazarus, did Lazarus hang out in front of their father’s house as well?

If anyone from the dead could have convinced his brothers to repent, would it not rather have been someone with whom they were familiar with, such as their own father? Oh! That’s right the rich man probably inherited most of his riches from his father so his father having been guilty of being rich was probably there with him in hell. Come now people how much more nonsense must one consider before they realize the absurdity in considering this a literal account of events rather than as a parable which it is.

Let us now interpret these last five verses as it they should be, parabolically or figuratively as they are presented by our Lord.

VERSE 27 AND 28 “Then he said, ‘I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father’s house, for I have five brothers that he may testify to them, lest they also come to this place of torment.’”

“Jeshurun,” a poetic nickname God gave Israel, had to do with the nation’s “rich man” condition. If the Jews had known the Law and the prophets, they would have realized the rich man in the parable was their own nation. “Jeshurun grew fat and kicked”; that is, the richness did not profit Jeshurun because of disobedience and a wrong heart condition (Deut 32:15).

Now let us consider the details of Verses 27 and 28. The rich man said, “Father Abraham, send Lazarus to my father’s house, for I have five brothers and Lazarus can testify to them lest they also come into this condition of torment.”

The symbolism of the rich man representing Israel can be defined even further. Of the two divisions of the nation of Israel, the two-tribe kingdom of Judah was more favored. Moreover, the Israelite’s who returned from Babylonian captivity in 536 B.C. were almost all from the two tribes, as were the Pharisees and other Jews who heard Jesus give the parable and those who rejected and crucified Jesus. (The ten tribes had already been dispersed throughout Gentile lands centuries before.) Even most of the Levites at that time, living close to Jerusalem, were from Judah. Therefore, the rich man specifically represents Judah, the two-tribe kingdom.

The chronology listing shows that Judah had five sons (Perez, Hezron, Carmi, Hur, and Shobal), and the rich man wanted to save them.” (1 Chron 4:1)

“Another interesting point in the parable is that the “five brethren” mentioned by the rich man were also said to have Abraham as their father. When the nation was released 500 years prior to our Lord’s first advent, those who actually returned to Palestine were mostly of two tribes, although a few from all tribes returned. If this one rich man stood for the two tribes, then the other ten tribes, the majority of which did not have the opportunity of coming in direct contact with the teachings of the Messiah at his first advent, would be properly represented by the five brethren, a ratio of one to two.”

Thus the petition by the rich man (the two tribes) to send Lazarus (Gentile believers) to testify to the five brothers (the ten tribes) of the work of Christ less they be found in the same torments as he.

“There has been an impassable gulf between the saintly Lazarus class and the Jews. God has not wished that the Jewish nation should amalgamate with other nations or with Christendom. He has a special work for the Jews to do in the near future, and for this very purpose He has preserved them as a people for now a little over thirty-five hundred years. In his sufferings the Jew at times has made an appeal, desiring that the Lazarus class might give a symbolical drop of water –of comfort and refreshment; but this has been denied.”

But now the word of the Lord is: “Comfort, yes, comfort my people! (Natural Israel)” Says your God (our God, the Church’s God). “Speak comfort to Jerusalem (dating from 1878 A.D. onward), and cry out to her, that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned; for she has received from the Lord’s hand Double for all her sins.”  (Isa 40:1, 2)

The first part of this “double” was a period of favor toward Israel from the death of Jacob to the death of Christ, 1845 years. The second half of this “double” the period in which she lost favor due to unfaithfulness lasted from the death of Christ in 33 A.D. to 1878 A.D. the same length of time 1845 years.

VERSE 29-31 “Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them. And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent. But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’ ”

One did actually go from the dead—Lazarus by name—but still they did not repent. In other words, the fact the beggar in the parable was named “Lazarus” is a reference to the Lazarus that Jesus would raise subsequently in the Jerusalem area. Jesus was on his way there now, so this parable would have been fresh in the Pharisees’ minds when the raising occurred. And even when Jesus himself was raised from the dead, the five brothers (Israel as a nation) did not believe.

This is the only parable where one of the characters has a name. That name is found only in this parable and in John 11 and 12 where Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead. In the parable “Abraham” says, “If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead” (Verse31).

The actual raising of Lazarus from the dead probably took place only a few weeks after Jesus gave this parable. Perhaps it was then that some of the Pharisees and most of the disciples remembered the parable and realized that the rich man referred to those who were literally “clothed in purple and fine linen, and fared sumptuously every day.”

Would such people be convinced by someone who came back from the dead? No! After Lazarus came back from the dead and more people began to believe on Jesus, we read, “The chief priests consulted that they might put Lazarus also to death” (John 12:10).

The brothers of the rich man “have Moses and the prophets” (Verse 29). Those who claimed to have Moses and the prophets were the scribes, lawyers, doctors of the law, Sadducee’s, and the like. They not only would not believe Jesus was the son of God after he performed miracles, they tried to discredit him because of the day when he performed them (John 5:16). They boastfully said, “We are Moses’ disciples” (John 9:28).

The Pharisees understood enough about the meaning of the parables to know Jesus was criticizing them. Luke 16:14 reads, “The Pharisees also, who were covetous, heard all these things: and they derided him.” If they did not understand the parables at least superficially, they would not have derided him. They would have shaken their heads and walked away muttering, “Who can understand this man’s cryptic sayings?”

Thus we conclude that both logic and reason deems this a parable.